Agnes sniffed again and then blew her nose. She could almost breathe again.
“I miss William,” she said.
Dora reached over and patted her hand.
“William was a rock of stability,” she said. “But—forgive me—he was hardly a romantic figure, Agnes. I was a little troubled when you married him, for I always thought you could do better. Oh, that word was very poorly chosen.Better, indeed. No one could have been better than William, God rest his soul. But I always thought you were made for sunshine and laughter and... oh, andromance. You were my dear little sister, and I expected to live vicariously through you as I dwindled into old age. I am talking nonsense. Viscount Ponsonby is titled and handsome and... what is the word? Attractive. And mysterious. One wonders what lies behind that mobile eyebrow of his. And... dangerous. Or perhaps it is just my spinster’s sensibilities that cause me to see him that way.”
“No,” Agnes said, stirring sugar into her tea. “Heisdangerous. To the peace of mind of anyone foolish enough to fall in love with him, anyway.”
“And you have fallen,” Dora said.
“Yes,” Agnes admitted. “But I will not marry him. I would be foolish.”
Dora sighed.
“I am hardly in a position to advise you, Agnes,” she said. “I have no experience. None whatsoever. I want you to be happy. I love you, you know, more than I love anyone else in the world.”
“Don’t set me off again,” Agnes said, lifting her cup to her lips and inhaling the steam. The fact that Dora had no experience, that she was a spinster at the age of thirty-eight, was at least partly Agnes’s fault. Or, if not exactly her fault, then at least it was on her account. But she could not dwell upon that now, or she would be a watering pot again. Besides, she never willingly thought about their mother and what she had done all those years ago, and Agnes and Dora never talked about it.
“Come.” Dora drank her tea, scalding as it still was, and set down her empty cup. She led the way into the sitting room and went immediately to the pianoforte. “Let me play for you.”
She had used to do it when the infant Agnes had refused to take her afternoon nap and had then been cross and droopy. Dora had always been able to put her to sleep with music.
Agnes sat and put her head back against the sofa cushion.
What was it that had given him sleepless nights?
Why had he suddenly thought the solution to whatever troubled him was to marry her?
She knew only the mask of bored, mocking ennui he presented to the world—with a few brief glimpses behind it. She suspected there were layers upon layers to be uncovered before one approached anywhere near his soul. Could anyone do it? Would he ever allow it, even with the woman he would eventually marry?
And would anyone rash enough to explore beyond the mask lose herself in the process?
She felt herself drifting toward sleep and opened her eyes to listen to the end of the piece Dora was playing. It was time they were both in bed. What on earth was she going to look like in the morning?
***
There was less than a week of their annual gathering left—a melancholy thought. Vincent was going to take everyone on a tour of his farms after breakfast. Lady Harper was going along to see the lambs and other newborns. Lady Darleigh was going to stay behind for a pianoforte lesson from Miss Debbins and to tend her baby. Lady Trentham was in bed, despite the fact that last night she had expressed enthusiasm for the farm visit. She was sleeping off a bout of nausea.
Hugo announced that last fact at the breakfast table with a look that was half-sheepish, half-triumphant.
“She is apt to be like this some mornings for a while,” he said, “though she has been able to fight it off until today. Not that she is ill or anything like that. Far from it. But... well.”
He rubbed his hands together, looked over the breakfast fare on the sideboard, and then proved thathisappetite was not impaired, even if his wife’s was.
“Congratulations are in order, then, are they, Hugo?” George asked.
“You did not hear it from me,” Hugo said with some alarm. “Gwendoline does not want anyone to know. She does not want any fuss. Or embarrassment.”
“I have not heard a thing,” Ben said. “This silverware is clattery stuff, Vince. It drowns out conversation at table and leaves one horribly uninformed.Whatdid you say, Hugo? Or what did youalmostsay?”
“I had noticed that about the cutlery too,” Imogen said. “But I daresay we did not miss anything of great importance.”
Flavian did not go out with everyone else. He had letters to write, he informed them before remembering that he had used that excuse once before. Good Lord, they would be thinking he was becoming the world’s champion correspondent.
He lurked alone at the drawing room window so that he would have a clear view down the driveway, and he watched Miss Debbins make what seemed to be her snaillike way up to the house, though no doubt she was walking at a perfectly respectable pace. As soon as she had disappeared up the steps below the window and he had allowed a moment or two for her to move from the hall toward the music room, he went downstairs, took up his coat and hat and gloves, which he had left there earlier, nodded genially to the footman on duty, and strode off down the steps and through the formal parterres.
It was one of those not-a-cloud-in-the-sky days again. They had been fortunate enough to have had several of them during their stay. The wind was almost nonexistent too. Tulips were blooming in a riot of color. They were surely earlier than usual this year. They would not suit Agnes Keeping’s soul, however. They were regimented and organized.
